Nexos.ai Secures $30M to Accelerate Enterprise AI Adoption
▼ Summary
– Nexos.ai raised €30 million in Series A funding led by Index Ventures and Evantic Capital to help companies securely adopt AI tools by acting as a middleman between employees and AI systems.
– The platform addresses corporate data leak risks by serving as a neutral intermediary, allowing safe AI use without sacrificing productivity gains.
– Founders Tomas Okmanas and Eimantas Sabaliauskas, known for bootstrapping Nord Security, now value VC support and are leveraging Evantic’s network of experts to guide product development.
– Nexos.ai offers an AI Workspace for employees and an AI Gateway that provides a single access point to 200+ AI models, focusing on security, cost management, and compliance.
– The startup targets tech-savvy and regulated industries, plans European and North American expansion, and aims to remove AI adoption barriers by demonstrating real value, such as cost savings in portfolio companies.
Nexos.ai has successfully secured a significant $30 million Series A funding round to advance its mission of enabling secure enterprise AI adoption. Many large organizations view artificial intelligence with a mix of hope and hesitation, often concerned about potential data security risks. A new venture founded by Tomas Okmanas and Eimantas Sabaliauskas, the co-founders behind cybersecurity leader Nord Security, aims to resolve this tension by providing a secure intermediary platform.
The platform functions as a neutral bridge between company employees and various AI systems. Okmanas describes the current environment as fostering “the biggest corporate data leak,” pointing to widespread employee use of large language models with sensitive company information. Instead of prohibiting AI tools, Nexos.ai positions itself as a trusted intermediary, allowing businesses to maintain control over their data while still benefiting from AI-driven productivity improvements.
This substantial funding round arrived remarkably quickly after the company’s initial $8 million seed funding. Led by Index Ventures and Evantic Capital, the Series A values Nexos.ai at approximately $350 million. Previous investors Creandum and Dig Ventures also contributed, alongside angel investors such as the CEOs of Datadog, Klarna, Supercell, and Wix. Evantic Capital, a new firm started by former Sequoia Capital partner Matt Miller, played a key role in initiating this round even though Nexos.ai was not actively seeking new investment.
Okmanas and Sabaliauskas, known for bootstrapping their previous ventures, now recognize the strategic advantages offered by venture capital support. Beyond financial backing, Nexos.ai gains access to Miller’s “Legends” network, a group of 140 experienced operators who provide guidance to Evantic’s portfolio companies in exchange for a share of fund profits. Okmanas participates in this network both as an advisor and a beneficiary, using expert insights to refine the company’s product roadmap.
The current Nexos.ai platform includes two main components: an AI Workspace for general employee use and an AI Gateway designed for developers. The gateway serves as a centralized control layer addressing security, compliance, and cost management. It also reduces fragmentation by providing a single access point to roughly 200 different AI models. A primary use of the new capital will be expanding support for private AI models, which is crucial for handling sensitive organizational data.
Customer acquisition is progressing steadily, with the team conducting between 50 and 60 product demonstrations each week. While traditional enterprises often require extensive internal discussions before AI adoption, Nexos.ai initially targets technology-forward companies already using AI tools regularly, along with organizations in heavily regulated sectors. These regulated companies frequently worry about data governance and the risks of sending confidential information to AI models hosted internationally.
The founders identified this market need while managing Tesonet, their venture building and investment company. Several Tesonet portfolio companies have become Nexos.ai customers, including Bulgarian fintech unicorn Payhawk, which maintains an office in Vilnius. The fresh capital will drive expansion throughout Europe and North America, helping more organizations overcome barriers to AI implementation.
Okmanas emphasizes that the real value of AI becomes clear through tangible business outcomes. He highlights one example within the Tesonet portfolio where web hosting provider Hostinger deployed an AI assistant that significantly reduced the need for human customer support. “That’s why we didn’t need to hire 500 people and saved €10 million this year alone,” Okmanas noted, though he declined to disclose Nexos.ai’s current revenue figures.
Looking ahead, the company plans to grow its team to 100 employees by its first anniversary, with most hires based in Europe. Growing concerns about data sovereignty in European public institutions have created additional opportunities for Nexos.ai, potentially opening a new market beyond its core enterprise focus.
(Source: TechCrunch)
